Industrial metaverse makes the “invisible visible” to drive sustainable growth

• Industrial metaverse is expected to reach $400 billion by 2030, with the potential to exceed $1 trillion, accelerating growth.

• Connected digital twins of industrial systems can facilitate rapid “what-if” simulations, improving the supply chain, utilisation, and operational costs.
• Industrial metaverse is less dependent on immersivity and interoperability compared to Consumer Metaverse.

Businesses need to make sure they don’t miss out on the additional potential that the industrial metaverse offers and it will not be possible to “leapfrog” to industrial metaverse implementation unless digitalisation is already fairly mature, industry experts said.

“Many businesses in GCC are already some way along the digitalisation journey – leveraging the power of digital twins, artificial intelligence, connectivity, and collaboration technologies. Businesses need to make sure they don’t miss out on the additional potential that the industrial metaverse offers for better-informed strategic decision-making for growth, profitability, and especially ensuring safety and sustainability,” Thomas Kuruvilla, Managing Partner of Arthur D. Little (ADL) Middle East, said.

What is an industrial metaverse?

The industrial metaverse provides an extensive overview of current and future applications and use cases and their benefits, from operational optimisation and training to technical tools and strategic management solutions. It also provides clear guidance on how companies can overcome the challenges towards full implementation.

Key steps include reviewing their digitalisation strategy, identifying value-adding opportunities, implementing pilots, and building a partner ecosystem for success.

ADL said that the industrial metaverse could lead to double-digit percentage improvements in areas such as supply chain, utilisation, and operational costs as well as driving growth and managing sustainability impacts, industry experts said and forecasts an acceleration of the industrial metaverse market, with an estimated size of $100-150 billion this year and expected to rise to $400 billion by 2030, although the upside could be more than $1 trillion, with an annual growth rate of between 20 per cent and 30 per cent.

Despite the current setbacks, Kuruvilla said the industrial metaverse has the potential to transform the way executives leverage digital technologies, elevating them from the operating level to the strategic level.

Connected digital twins

Despite the current sense of disillusionment with the Metaverse, new research by ADL reveals that businesses would be wrong to write it off. The continuing convergence of developing technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, complex systems simulation, data visualisation, and connectivity (IoT), has the potential to enable executives to extend the use of digital twins beyond the factory level towards strategy simulation for an entire global enterprise.

“Strategic decision-making is increasingly difficult due to increasing complexity, uncertainty, and the challenges of managing sustainability across global supply chains. Through creating connected digital twins of whole industrial systems and supply chains, businesses can rapidly conduct “what-if” simulations for strategic decision-making,” Kuruvilla said.

However, unlike the consumer metaverse, he said that progress on the industrial metaverse is much less dependent on full immersivity and interoperability, two of the biggest current barriers towards metaverse adoption.

Industry 4.0 technologies have proven to bring significant benefits to companies that have successfully implemented them.

Digitalisation challenges

What makes the industrial metaverse distinct from Industry 4.0 is the ongoing development and convergence of many of these technologies. Digital twins, with some form of real data exchange with their physical counterparts and the application of AI to assist interpretation and analysis, already exist today. 

According to data from Arthur D. Little’s Operational Excellence Database, these benefits are substantial, including reductions in operational capital deployed and supply chain costs ranging from 15 per cent to 30 per cent. 

Additionally, companies have seen a 30 per cent increase in production capacity utilisation and maintenance cost reductions of 10 per cent to 40 per cent.

Nevertheless, there are some common challenges towards digitalisation, including high upfront investment, difficulties in coordinating the required cross-functional transformation, challenges in data security and management, lack of available skills, and limitations imposed by legacy IT systems.

Albert Meige, Director of Blue Shift at Arthur D. Little, said that conventional strategic decision-making is no longer sufficient and companies must harness the potential of the industrial metaverse to drive performance improvements, optimise operations, and achieve net-zero growth.

“Unlike the consumer metaverse, the industrial metaverse does not depend on full immersivity and interoperability, so these barriers are less significant going forward.”

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